


Journey

by wormwood700



Category: The Lord of the Rings - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-21
Updated: 2017-10-21
Packaged: 2019-01-21 02:45:10
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 675
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12448044
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wormwood700/pseuds/wormwood700
Summary: Faramir is woken by an old, inherited dream.





	Journey

Faramir fell out of the dream in the early hours of the morning; shaking and choking on a vision of salt water. Ghosts scattered like chaff as he woke and rose to the surface.  
His face felt sore, as if it had been battered by blunt needles of sand and salt pushed ahead of cold winds.  
  
He took in the contours of the room, the large bed, the tall window, the nearly full wine bottle on the small table beneath it, the empty glass....  
He was in the City, arrived from Ithilien the previous night.  
  
He got up and wrapped himself in one of the blankets from the bed, walked to the window and put his forehead against the cool glass.  
  
The dream of the flood - the inherited, collective dream of his lineage. Usually it was vague; a chasm, a roar, a rush of water.   
This time it had been different.   
  
_The water a rapid, oozing, clammy thing jamming its head into the material fabric of towns and villages and tearing them apart. Houses bobbed like paper boats in the seepage a short while, before they were swept away._  
  
Faramir filled the wine glass and emptied it. The dream was still playing out in his head.  
  
_It was early morning when the waters burst in on the everyday, catching people doing nothing out of the ordinary._  
A mother standing by the kitchen fireplace with her child on her hip after a sleepless night. Poking the embers, rubbing her tired eyes with her free hand.  
A married couple sharing their usual weary morning-look, before moving on to the tasks of the day that allowed them to avoid each-other until evening.   
A woman pushing her face into the hollow of her lover's neck, breathing in the scent of sleep and sweat.   
  
The water extinguished fires, drowned executioners and prisoners; flooded the libraries...   
It had erased the individual memories, but the force of accumulated terror embedded itself forever in the dreams of those who escaped and their descendants.  
  
The dawn light seeped soft and pale through the window and the crimson liquid in his glass.  
_Now the light is less delicate..._  
  
He wished she was there, in the bed on the other side of the room. This was the first time he was away from them all since the winter solstice.   
Things were easier. Little Mariel had grown stronger with the light, even if she still was a delicate, fragile-looking thing.  
_Aren't we all in the end? And all subject to blind forces beyond control..._  
  
He was fine with that. He had found he'd rather accept an absence of design than stories of higher powers letting the many suffer for the evil of the few.  
  
He looked over to the empty bed again.   
_He has her symmetry embedded in his palms and fingertips. She has a valley between her shoulder-blades frequently flooded by his roaming hands._  
  
He knew he would likely outlive her.  
  
The people who died so long ago had passed on some of their longevity as well as their terror. Their ghosts had haunted his dreams as long as he could remember.  
He had learned to accept them as part of the fabric, those ghosts that never left. Usually they just hovered quietly in corners and under ceilings like forgotten spider-webs. His mind and the City were full of them.   
  
The sun hoisted itself slowly above the rooftops, bringing with it a smell of moisture evaporating from rain-wet stone. It was an old, comforting smell. He remembered two elongated shadows reflected off wet cobbles a spring evening long ago. One stretching further than the other.  
  
Faramir felt salt tears fall onto his hands. He had been loved, and he had loved back. He was loved, and he loved back. In the end that was all he could ask for.   
  
He knew he was exhausted - he hadn't stopped for months.  
He decided to excuse himself from his duties that day. If anyone asked, he would say that he needed some time to recover from his long journey.

 


End file.
